Rain Rain everywhere

Well, for the better part of the last 4 weeks we have been getting rained on here in Houston. It seems like forever since I have seen two days go by without any rain. It really sucks. But, that is the price of living in a city that used to be a swamp.

The good news, it did not rain on the Fourth of July or fathers day. That means Laura got to go swimming both days. Now the fourth of July swimming was really cold. It had been raining for three weeks at that point. But she still splashed and floated around quiet happily for a couple of hours.

But still, I am starting to feel like we are all walking around in a permanent pruney state from all of the water. The rain sure beats the heat and humidity that we normally get.

Through all of it, Laura is just as happy as she always is. As long as someone plays with her is paying attention to her, she does not care what is going on with the rest of the world.

That is not entirely true. Laura has a new teacher at school. She does not know the teacher yet so she gets clingy and cries when mommy drops her off each morning. We know this is just a stage she is going through, but it is still tough to walk away from our crying daughter.

We meet with the lady that will be Laura's new teacher at The Rise School next week. The meeting should be about an hour. I think it is mostly to discuss where Laura is currently at, and what we would like for her to accomplish in the next year.

We are having a hard time with this. We know The Rise School is the best place for Laura, but she will not be right down the hall from Tara anymore. We cannot just pop in and see her when we want to. This is going to be rough. But, this is what is best for Laura. And that is what we want. I am not looking forward to this.

Overall, Laura's therapist's think she is doing well. She is still not crawling, but at this point it is by her choice. She can easily hold herself up on all fours and rock (she is really quite good at it). She is getting to the point where she can stand without you having to be ready to catch her. She can hold herself up. Her therapists do want her to crawl before she walks. I am not sure if Laura agrees with this. Time will tell.

The Down Syndrome Association of Houston (http://www.dsah.org/) has scheduled their Buddy Walk for this year. It will be Saturday November 6th at Jones plaza. Laura will once again have a team. Her team is Laura's Lions. The walk is free for anyone and everyone who wants to come out, just register first so there is a record of who came out. We look forward to seeing you there. Here is hoping we can raise a ton of money for at free event.

First's

Laura has had a busy week this week, and it is only Tuesday.

Yesterday (Monday 5-24-10) Laura decided it was time she helped to feed herself. This is something that Tara and Laura have been working on for some time. The closest Laura has gotten to accomplishing this goal, was to be able to grab her bowls, bang them briefly then toss them on the floor. A big mess is sometimes made (if there was food in them), and big laugh is had by Laura and whoever saw her do it (this makes me wonder if she has my diabolical streak), then we clean up and try again.

Yesterday, at her snack time, she purposefully reached forward and pulled her snack to her mouth and began chewing. She was working on two different items. The first one is a little cloth like baggy that you put chucks of fruit in to. The purpose of this device is to teach children to chew. The theory is that the child bites down on the fruit filled bag and some of the juice from the fruit comes out. To me it sounds kind of weird, but it is actually kind of cool. Laura was able to pick her fruit baggy up several times, and get it to her mouth to chew on. She did this with little help and allot of encouragement from Tara. She even worked on transferring the bag from one hand to the other.

Laura also took a rice cracker from Tara's had and chewed on it. In the past, the closest Laura had gotten to something like this would involve her grabbing one of our hands that had some of her food in it, and she would then pull that hand to her and we would have to guide the food into her mouth. However, yesterday she took the cracker from Tara's hand and chewed on it several times. I am hoping to have a video of this posted on my FaceBook page later today.

Beyond the chewing, she is getting better at standing. And, she happily drinks her bottle through a straw. We are still sometime away from her drinking out of a cup, but we are getting closer. She can hold a cup or glass all by herself though. I know these may only seem like little things to some people, but to us they are huge, and we are very excited.

The Perpetual Motion Machine

Some of you have read the post where I speculated that Laura may in fact be an alien. I admit it is a interesting notion, and is certainly funny when you really think about it.

Another acurate description would be to say she is a perpetual motion machine. Unless she is being hled she is constantly on the go. Yes, I know she does not crawl yet. However, when she is laying down (on her back, side or stomach, it makes no difference), or when we are trying to get her to sit up, she is constantly moving. Even whe she is asleep, she has some place to go. She stayed home with me on my day off last week, and she wore me out. I think Tara and I are going to have to put a bell on her when she starts crawling.

Now, when you combine that constant energy with what appears to be an unquenchable curiosuty, I think we are toast. When she is awake, her head is on a swivle. She is constatly turning it. She tries to study anything and everything. She wants to be apart of everything. It really is kind of cool to see.

It is funny how our life mimicks Laura. Starting yesterday was the start of a very busy 8 days. Laura's Granny had a party to intorduce Laura to all of Granny's friends yesterday. Natually Laura was a big hit, and soaked up the constant attention. She was happily passed from one lady to the next, and she loved every minute of it. The party started at 2:00 pm and we did not get home until nearlly 8:00 pm. Laura got some really cool new stuff at the party as well. So to all of you who brought gifts, Thank you.

Of course Tara and I are both working this week. At R.E.I. we have a group of new hires I get to train later this week. That means a little more to do at home during the week. Saturday is the Down Syndrome Association of Houston Buddy Walk (go to www.dsah.org to sign up or donate). Our team, Laura's Lions, has around fourty walkers signed up, and they are coiming in from all over to be apart of the action. Then Sunday Laura has her Bible Presentation at Second Baptist Church Houston at the 9:30 service at the Woodway campus. It is looking like there will be a big turn out for that as well.

So our life this week will feel like it is non stop. We will be in perpetual motion. We do have a few pictures from yesterday, that I will try to post later this week. I will also try to post the Picture we have of Laura in her tutu. It was her costume for Halloween. She was very cute.

Things are becoming . . . Normal?

That's right folks, after only 4 months of capture and domination by this completely alien thing in our lives, and we are starting to see some normalcy again. Of course I am reasonably sure Laura is not an actual alien, but what better description for a semi gelatinous mass that squirms, wiggles (around our house we have combined the two words to form a new more powerful word squiggle), makes weird noises (which she will do for long periods of time, whether you are there to talk back to her or not) and completely dominates every aspect of our lives. She smiles almost constantly. Nothing like that big toothless grin to turn the day around. Perhaps further evidence that Laura might be an alien, she has unusual powers (as I just mentioned, her smile).

The girl is a mess. For a child that cannot move under her own power, she is all over the place. Tara and I live in constant fear of two things. First, that when she starts to crawl and walk we will never get any rest as she will be on the go. I had really better start getting into better shape. In truth this would be a great thing. She already shows incredible curiosity about her surroundings. We are very excited about reaching a time when she can explore them more thoroughly.

The second thing we live in fear of, is that Laura will be a constant talker. You know, the type of person that just never shuts up, no matter what you do or say to them to get them to leave you alone. As I said above, Laura is constantly making all kinds of noises, whether you are there or not. That is great. Tara and I encourage her constantly to be more vocal. But we are afraid that once she figures out how to form words, she will go from two and three words sentences to hours long dissertations on her stuffed animal in no time. God help us all. Actually, given her Down Syndrome I would be very proud of her if she were to make that leap.

Ok, now for the updates. By now Laura should be over 14.5 pounds. She had her 4 month check up and shots last week and she weighed 14 pounds 6 ounces. She is 24 inches long. This all means that she is above the 90% range for height and weight. That is great news. Everything I have described in the post so far continues to point to Laura's surgery being a complete success. We are incredibly grateful for that.

Other tidbits. We are down to 6 feeds a day. This means we have an 8 hour period at night where we can try to get some sleep. I hope we are able to further reduce her number of feeds in the not to distant future. Yes she sleeps very well through the night.

Laura has successfully rolled from her back to her belly all on her own. Tara and I were very excited to see this. Laura looked a little confused about how she had gotten that way, but once she got back onto her back again she tried to turn over again.

She is also starting to reach for things. Up until now, if she had something in her hand it was either placed there or she found it by accident. Now she pulls burp clothes off of shoulders to suck on them. She also reaches for toys that she can see in her stroller or carrier.

Most importantly, she is starting to figure out how to feed from her bottle. For over a month before her surgery she fed pretty much from an NG tube. She has fed primarily from the tube since her surgery. We work with her on almost every feed. She is constantly taking about 5 mL. But she usually has one feed a day where she will take more. This is a great thing.

So as you can see things are constantly changing around here. It is fun to see it all happening. I will try to get pictures up soon. We have some great ones.

Just a reminder, the Down Syndrome Association of Houston 2009 Buddy walk is November 14th at Jones plaza. There is still time to sign up to walk or donate to DSAH. To do either go to www.dsah.org. On the left side of your screen you will see the word Buddywalk. Click on it. Then in the middle of your screen you will see a link to the 2009 Buddywalk page. Click on that link. Then click on the link for Find Team. In the first blank field on the right side of your screen type Laura's Lions, and click the search button just below. Then click on the link to Laura's Lions team page. From there you can donate, sign up to walk or both. To all those who have already donated or signed up to walk, we cannot thank you enough.